United States Court of Appeals

For the Eighth Circuit

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No. 15-2231

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Richard Yang,

lllllllllllllllllllll Plaintiff - Appellant,

v.

Missouri Department of Corrections; George Lombardi, Director, MDOC; John

Doe; Tom Clements, Director of Division of Adult Institutions; Mariann Atwell,

Director, Division of Offender Rehabilitative Services; Patricia Cornell, Deputy

Division Director; Fred Johnson, Deputy Warden, Potosi Correctional Center; Don

Roper, Warden, Potosi Correctional Center; Omer L. Clark, Deputy Warden,

Southeast Correctional Center; William (Bill) Stange, Deputy Warden, Southeast

Correctional Center; Allan Hughes, Committee Member, Southeast Correctional

Center; Angela Riddell, CCA, Southeast Correctional Center; Dwayne Kempker,

Deputy Director, Division of Adult Institutions; K. Malloy, Functional Unit

Manager, Potosi Correctional Center; G. Phagley, Committee Member, Potosi

Correctional Center; Cindy Griffin, Functional Unit Manager, Potosi Correctional Center,

lllllllllllllllllllll Defendants - Appellees.

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Appeal from United States District Court 

for the Eastern District of Missouri - Cape Girardeau

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 Submitted: April 14, 2016

 Filed: August 15, 2016

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Before COLLOTON and SHEPHERD, Circuit Judges, and MOODY,1

 District Judge.

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COLLOTON, Circuit Judge.

Richard Yang, an inmate in Missouri, appeals the dismissal of his lawsuit

against several officials of the Missouri Department of Corrections under 42 U.S.C.

§ 1983. Yang alleged that the officials violated his constitutional rights when they

censored his Chinese-language mail and denied him the ability to place telephone calls

to China. The district court2

 granted summary judgment for the officials, and we

affirm. 

I.

Yang was born in China in 1940. He moved to the United States in 1984 and

is now a citizen. Yang has been incarcerated in the Missouri Department of

Corrections since 2005, when he was sentenced to twenty years in prison for seconddegree murder. 

Yang’s first language is Mandarin Chinese. He can speak, read, and write

English, although he claims he cannot fully express himself in English. Yang’s

relatives remain in China, and none of them understands English. 

When he was first imprisoned, the Department allowed Yang to correspond in

Chinese. But from late 2007 to some point in 2008, and again after January 2011,

1

The Honorable James M. Moody, Jr., United States District Judge for the

Eastern District of Arkansas, sitting by designation. 

2

The Honorable Stephen N. Limbaugh, Jr., United States District Judge for the

Eastern District of Missouri.

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Department officials refused for security reasons to deliver Yang’s incoming and

outgoing mail written in Chinese. 

The officials restricted Yang’s Chinese-language mail pursuant to the

Department’s censorship and mail policies. Those policies provide for censoring of

mail that poses a threat to the security of the penal institution. Items written in a

“language that staff are unable to interpret with current available resources” are said

to present such a threat. Thus, all mail in a foreign language is sent to a committee

that determines whether an employee-interpreter is available by reviewing the

Department’s “institutional translator list.” If an employee can interpret the mail, it

is sent to that employee for review and screening before delivery to its intended

destination. But if no employee on the list can interpret the mail, the committee

censors the mail and informs the inmate of the basis for its decision. 

At all times relevant to this litigation, no Department employees could read or

translate Mandarin Chinese. Because several employees knew Spanish, however, the

Department screened other inmates’ Spanish-language mail during the periods when

Yang’s Chinese-language mail was rejected. 

Yang twice complained about the treatment of his mail through the

Department’s grievance process. He explained that his family was unable to

understand English, requested permission to send and receive Chinese-language mail,

and demanded that the Department provide an interpreter who could review the mail

and clear it for delivery. Department officials denied Yang’s grievances.

Yang also sought to place telephone calls to his family and friends in China. 

Before February 2012, the Department prohibited all international calls. After that

date, international calling was permitted, but Yang temporarily remained unable to

call people in China due to technical difficulties. The Department’s internationalcalling provider resolved those issues, and Yang may now call his family in China. 

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Throughout histime in prison, Yang has been able to place domestic telephone

calls and to send and receive English-language mail. Yang mailed a couple letters in

English to his family in China. Yang also attempted to contact a few acquaintances

in the United States by mail and telephone. The recipients of Yang’s communications,

including family members in China, neither responded to his letters nor accepted his

phone calls. 

In May 2012, Yang, proceeding pro se, brought a § 1983 action against the

Department and several officials. Yang alleged that the defendants had infringed his

rights under the First Amendment, the Equal Protection Clause, and the Due Process

Clause by denying him the ability to correspond in Chinese or to place telephone calls

to his family and friends in China. Yang sought declaratory and injunctive relief, as

well as money damages for past constitutional violations. 

The district court dismissed Yang’s complaint against the Department for

failure to state a claim and granted summary judgment for the officials. Yang

appealed the summary-judgment orders pro se, and the court appointed counsel to

represent Yang at oral argument. The court expresses its appreciation to appointed

counsel for his zealous efforts on Yang’s behalf.

Summary judgment is appropriate if there is no genuine dispute as to any

material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Fed. R. Civ.

P. 56(a). We review the district court’s ruling de novo, viewing the evidence in the

light most favorable to Yang. Murphy v. Mo. Dep’t of Corr., 372 F.3d 979, 982 (8th

Cir. 2004). 

II.

Yang first asserts that the officials violated his First Amendment rights. A

prison inmate retains those First Amendment rights that are not “inconsistent with his

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status as a prisoner or with the legitimate penological objectives of the corrections

system.” Pell v. Procunier, 417 U.S. 817, 822 (1974). These include the right to

communicate with persons outside the prison walls, subject to regulation that protects

legitimate governmental interests. Procunier v. Martinez, 416 U.S. 396, 412-13

(1974); Thongvanh v. Thalacker, 17 F.3d 256, 258 (8th Cir. 1994); Benzel v.

Grammar, 869 F.2d 1105, 1108 (8th Cir. 1989). 

When a prison regulation impinges on an inmate’s ability to communicate with

others, it is valid if it is “reasonably related to legitimate penological objectives.” 

Turner v. Safley, 482 U.S. 78, 89, 99 (1987); Ortiz v. Fort Dodge Corr. Facility, 368

F.3d 1024, 1026 & n.2 (8th Cir. 2004). In making that determination, we consider

(1) whether the regulation is rationally connected to a legitimate and neutral

governmental interest; (2) whether the inmate has an alternative means of exercising

the constitutional right; (3) the impact accommodating the inmate’s asserted right

would have on prison staff, prisoners, and resources; and (4) whether ready

alternatives to the regulation exist. Turner, 482 U.S. at 89-91; see also Thornburgh

v. Abbott, 490 U.S. 401, 414-19 (1989). Yang bears the burden of proving that the

Department’s regulations are unreasonable. See Overton v. Bazzetta, 539 U.S. 126,

132 (2003). 

Yang’s lawsuit spans many years of his incarceration, and the precise nature of

his claims varies based on the correctional policies in effect at a given time. The

broadest complaint is that the Department officials unreasonably restricted his First

Amendment rights when they censored his Chinese-language mail and prohibited

international calling at the same time. 

We conclude, however, that the restrictions were reasonably related to

legitimate penological objectives. The rules were rationally related to the legitimate

governmental interest in security: If prison officials could not monitor an inmate’s

communications with people outside the facility in an unfamiliar language, then they

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would be vulnerable to escape, smuggling of contraband, and other planning of

criminal activity. See Ortiz, 368 F.3d at 1026; see also Murchison v. Rogers, 779 F.3d

882, 887 (8th Cir. 2015). Both the mail and telephone regulations were “neutral,” in

the sense that they “further[ed] an important or substantial governmental interest

unrelated to the suppression of expression.” Abbott, 490 U.S. at 415-16 (internal

quotation omitted). Yang had alternative means of communicating with outsiders. 

He retained the ability to make domestic calls, send correspondence in English, and

receive visitors. See Ortiz, 368 F.3d at 1027. 

Yang objects that his family in China cannot understand English, and that he

cannotfully express himself by writing in a second language. But an alternative “need

not be ideal,” Overton, 539 U.S. at 135, and Yang’s pro se pleadings in this litigation

demonstrate that he can communicate adequately in English. Yang testified that he

believed that there was a translation service in the city where his family resides, and

the Constitution does not require the State to bear the burden of paying for translation

in any event. Ortiz, 368 F.3d at 1027.

Yang has not demonstrated that there is a readily available alternative that

would have eased the restriction on his ability to communicate without imposing

financial burdens on the State. He suggests that the Department could arrange a

translator for his mail. This court required that step in Thongvanh, where a refugee

service center offered a cost-free translation service, and officials gave no explanation

why foreign-language correspondence could not be routed through the center. 17 F.3d

at 258-59. But Yang has not identified a cost-free way for the Department to monitor

his non-English correspondence, and prison officials are not required to absorb more

than a de minimis cost to facilitate foreign-language communications. Ortiz, 368 F.3d

at 1027. The district court, therefore, correctly rejected Yang’s First Amendment

claim based on the periods when Yang could neither correspond in Chinese nor place

international telephone calls. 

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The officials, a fortiori, did not violate Yang’s rights during periods when he

could correspond in Chinese, but was prohibited from placing international telephone

calls. The current policies likewise pass muster. Under those rules, Yang may

communicate via international or domestic telephone calls in Chinese or English, by

mail in English, or through in-person visits. One might see tension between a

regulation that forbids correspondence written in Chinese but allows telephone calls

in foreign tongues, but a prison rule that addresses a legitimate security concern is not

unreasonable merely because it is underinclusive. See Ortiz, 368 F.3d at 1026-27; see

also Murchison, 779 F.3d at 890. 

Yang next contends that the Department officials violated his equal protection

rights when they treated him less favorably than Spanish-speaking inmates. Yang

argues that the officials translated and screened Spanish-language mail but rejected

his Chinese-language mail. Yang also asserts that after the Department allowed

international telephone calling in February 2012, Spanish-speaking inmates were able

to place calls to Mexico immediately, while he remained unable to call his family and

friends in China. 

There is no evidence that differential treatment of foreign-language mail was

motivated by race or national origin or that the treatment of Chinese-language mail

was a pretext for discrimination. See Weiler v. Purkett, 137 F.3d 1047, 1051-52 (8th

Cir. 1998) (en banc). The only evidence on this point shows that prison officials

arranged for translation of Spanish-language mail because employees with language

skills were available to read it, while there was no staff able to translate Chinese. For

the reasons discussed, the Department’s approach to Chinese-language mail was

reasonably related to legitimate penological objectives. It was not a racial

classification subject to heightened scrutiny. Cf. Johnson v. California, 543 U.S. 499,

510-12 (2005). Similarly, any difference in timing between the authorization of

inmate telephone calls to Mexico and calls to China was explained by technical

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difficulties of a third party, not by discrimination at the hands of state officials based

on race or national origin.

Yang raises a procedural due process claim, arguing that the officials did not

give himnotice of appealrights and an opportunity to appeal the Department’s denials

of his grievances. This claim is belied by evidence that Yang twice exhausted the

Department’s grievance procedures, including his right to appeal. Yang was able to

exhaust his claims administratively and to litigate them in federal court, so there is no

showing of an injury from any alleged procedural irregularities. See Knight v.

Lombardi, 952 F.2d 177, 179 (8th Cir. 1991).

* * *

For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the district court is affirmed.

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